Gizoogle site puts search results into izzle-speak

Pop Culture

There are words and phrases that manipulate their way into the collective language of coolness - making them so uncool.

ADVERTISEMENT

Print-ready version

Send to a friend

Subscribe to the Banner-Herald

E-mail the Editor

Discuss in Forums

"You da man!" is one such phrase. A few years ago, it had 50-year-old guys in office slacks pointing finger guns.

And who can forget "Wassup?!"

After this story, we can add all things "izzle."

Fo shizzle. Fo realizzle.

Because now, for the Internet gangsta inside us all, there is Gizoogle.

Reader be warned: This isn't a family-friendly Web site.

Gizoogle is the illegitimate, thugged-out cousin of Google that translates its search results into Snoop Dogg slang, or izzle-speak. Enter "Vice President Dick Cheney" in the search field and it turns up "Vizzy President Dizzle Cheney." It then supplies the same information on the subjects as Google does - except it's izzle-filled and obscenity laden.

We can thank MTV for this.

MTV is the hub for izzle-isms and Snoop Dogg's sketch comedy show, "Doggy Fizzle Televizzle." Thus, giz-illions of izzles reach places like York, Pa., and people like John Beatty, who created Gizoogle.

"I was talking to my buddy on AOL Instant Messenger," said Beatty, a 28-year-old Web designer, "and he always talks in that izzle-speak, and I do it to my wife all the time and she hates it. I was thinking that it might be cool if there was a site that searched and all of the answers came up in that format."

It started as a joke and a homage to Snoop Dogg for bringing izzle-speak back to the hip lexicon. But now the Web site is clocking 60,000 hits a day, according to Beatty. In February, the site landed at No. 4 on Entertainment Weekly's "Must List." Only U2's "All Because of You" video, Patricia Arquette in "Medium" and the movie "Aliens of the Deep" were rated cooler.

Now we have Gizoogle.

In geek-speak, here is how the site works: Using a programming language called PHP, the program counts the syllables and vowels and adds "izzle" whenever possible and also throws in some of Snoop's lyrics. As a homage to Snoop's show, "I made it so that television pops up as televizzle every time," said Beatty, whose full-time job is running Originalicons.com, a Web site that provides instant-messaging buddy icons.

The Gizoogle site also offers a translator called a "textilizer." If you input the words to something, say, sweet and innocent, such as the "Barney" theme song, and hit enter you get something like: I love you/ you love me/ we're one stoked family/ witta bootylicious big hug and a kiss fizzle from me ta you/ won't you say you love me, too?

The Gizoogle site mirrors Google's multicolored lettering, but the O's in Gizoogle are filled with chromed-out wheel rims.

"When I first put the site up, I had these crappy gold spoke rims on there and then my friend was like, you have got to get some spinners on there," Beatty said.

Google officials aren't commenting, but this isn't the first time Google has had to deal with folks biting its style. In 2004, lawyers for Google challenged Booble, a porn search engine. Booble changed its look and is still up and running.

And Beatty isn't the only one out there izzilating. The master himself, Snoop Dogg, has his own version on his Web site, SnoopDogg.com. "After I put the site up, someone called me and told about Snoop's thing," Beatty said.

Gizoogle "is a parody site," he said. "... I think that the people at Google have a pretty good sense of humor. It is all in good fun. ... I look at this like a science project. I am just trying to see how far I can take it."